A German girl has booked her place at the top of the class by beating Bradford students at their own language.

Seventeen-year-old exchange student Anyka Oelsner has taught her classmates a lesson by becoming the only person in her Salts Grammar School sixth-form to score an A grade in her English Literature studies.

Wunderkind Anyka, from East Berlin, has been studying the classics of English Literature such as Shakespeare's Richard II at the school since September when she came to Yorkshire to help improve her English.

But the modest teenager said she was quite embarrassed when she was told she had outdone her fellow pupils at their own language.

She said: "When I got my work back and it said 'A grade -- brilliant work' I was really pleased. But when everybody else said they'd got B grades I was a bit embarrassed, to be honest.

"But everybody was really pleased for me, so it wasn't too bad.

"At first I found the old English language in Shakespeare a bit hard. I couldn't understand the first two acts at all, but after a while it started to make sense."

Anyka, who is already fluent in French and Russian, said: "The most important thing for me when I came was to improve my language. When I'm older I want to go into the hotel business and you need at least three languages for that.

"But I also wanted to learn a lot about the culture here and make a lot of friends. Since I've been here it's been brilliant -- I don't want to go home now!

"The people have been so friendly and I love the language. I've fitted in really well and I feel quite at home here now."

During her stay in Bradford Anyka has been staying with University administrators David and Carol Jennings, in Baildon.

Mr Jennings said: "She's a star pupil. She's had to work really hard to keep up with her English friends, but she's really done well. To come top of the class in a foreign language is some achievement.

"She's a lovely girl and very popular. We'll really miss her when she's gone."

e-mail: ian.midgley@bradford.newsquest.co.uk